Union beats Boston College to advance to Frozen Four final

By DILLON FRIDAY, Special to the Times

Thursday, April 10, 2014

PHILADELPHIA — Coming into the Thursday national semifinal, Boston College’s top line was receiving all the press. After all, the trio of Johnny Gaudreau, Bill Arnold and Kevin Hayes had combined for 192 points on the season.

Gaudreau accounted for 77 himself.

Union, though, proved it had the firepower to match. The Dutchmen’s first line of Daniel Carr, Mike Vecchione and Daniel Ciampini provided the punch in a 5-4 Union win. Ciampini scored a hat trick. Vecchione had a goal and an assist. Carr added an assist as well. The group sent 16 shots on net.

“We have to respect the line,” Ciampini said of his vaunted opponents. “They’re a great line and we tried to keep them off the score sheet. But at the same time, we can’t sit back. We had to keep pushing the pace, and that’s something we talked about.”

Even though none of the three featured in the scoring of Union’s first goal, the Vecchione’s line all but created it. After an even first period that saw BC take an early lead through Gaudreau, the Dutchmen grabbed the momentum in the second. Vecchione drove hard to the net and shoveled a shot on goal. The puck eventually found its way to Mat Bodie at the point. He faked a slapshot, rounded a sliding defender, and fired a bullet past Thatcher Demko’s shoulder.

Union coach Rick Bennett continued to ride his top guys in the ensuing minutes. Once down 8-7 in shots on goal, the Dutchmen led by as many as 10 in the second. Ciampini gave the Dutchmen their first lead at the 10:45 mark. He jumped on a rebound after Demko kicked away Shayne Gotisbehere’s point shot.

With the Dutchmen pushing the pace, the game livened up. The two teams combined for 19 shots in the first period. They fired 32 on net in the second.

Steve Santini restored the tie game with a blistering wrist shot from the right point with 4:07 remaining in the second. It was as close as BC would get.

Ciampini gave Union a 3-2 lead on his second of the night, this one on the power play. He tipped in Gotisbehere’s one-timer off Vecchione’s pass.

Boston College coach Jerry York called it a turning point.

“I thought the power play goal in the third period, the shot from the point was a turning point in this game,” he said. “We had to answer it with our five-minute power play.”

The power play he spoke of came directly after Ciampini’s second goal. Union’s Matt Hatch crashed into BC defenseman Michael Sit, sending him head first into the boards. Hatch was assessed a major penalty for checking from behind and a game misconduct.

The Eagles, with an opportunity to score multiple times on the man advantage, failed to muster any chances.

“We were just kind of out of sync there,” said Arnold of the squandered power-play. “Trying to force too much ... you can’t do that against a good penalty kill.”

“When (Hatch took his penalty), we just came together and talked on the bench and said, ‘it’s time to bear down,’” Union’s Bodie said. “It’s an unfortunate play from Mat Hatch. But we’re a family, and he’s one of our brothers. We didn’t want him to go out that way. Everyone stepped up and we didn’t really give them much.”

Union escaped unscathed and then some. In the moments following the penalty kill, Kevin Sullivan stripped Santini of the puck and went in on a breakaway. Demko sprawled out to make the save, but couldn’t recover in time for Vecchione’s follow-up. The freshman center buried the rebound into a wide open net. It was a back-breaking series of events.

BC pulled Dempko with 2:20 remaining on the clock. The extra attacker helped Ryan Fitzgerald pull the Eagles back to within one. Any uneasiness on the Union bench quickly dissipated, though. Ciampini dashed BC’s dreams with his hat trick goal, this one an empty-net effort that came just 36 seconds after Fitzgerald’s marker. It was the first national semifinal hat trick since Nathan Gerbe, playing for BC, accomplished the feat in 2008.

Patrick Brown’s consolation goal at the 19:55 mark closed the scoring on an eventful evening. The teams combined for nine goals and 79 shots on goal, 59 of which came in the latter two periods.

Gaudreau collected an assist, his third point of the night, on Brown’s goal to push his season total to 80 points — a milestone moment to be sure. He’ll return to Boston with some hardware — he’s the favorite to take home the Hobey Baker award on Friday — but it won’t be a national championship.

Vecchione, Ciampini, and company will play for Union’s first on Saturday.